49ers settle in as 2-point favorites over Carolina, continuing their streak of Vegas playoff power

The 49ers currently are 2-point road favorites over the Carolina Panthers for Sunday’s divisional-round game in Charlotte, making the 49ers the only road team that isn’t a large underdog this weekend.

In the other games, currently on the Vegas boards…

-Seattle is an 8-point favorite at home over New Orleans;

-New England is a 7.5-point home favorite over Indianapolis;

-Denver is a 10-point favorite at home over San Diego.

Other than the 49ers number, this weekend’s lines don’t seem like movers to me.,

The 49ers’ point-spread, though, already as been a little volatile–it opened with Carolina favored in the early off-shore books Sunday evening, then quickly moved to the 49ers’ side once Vegas posted the number yesterday morning and it has stayed there.

Which got me thinking…

What’s the history of the 49ers’ playoff point-spreads since they started making the postseason regularly after the 2011 regular season?

Here it is, according to the point-spreads near the end of the week leading up to each of the 49ers’ playoff games in the Jim Harbaugh era…

Yep, pending late movement this week, the 49ers will have only been underdogs in one playoff game since 2011… which was their first one of the Harbaugh era, it was at home, and they won it outright.

The 49ers have been Vegas favorites in their last six playoff games, with three of those coming as road favorites.

Vegas likes them. Likes them a lot.
Overall, the 49ers are 3-2-1 vs. the Vegas spread (that I used on Thursday of game week for the NFL Picks post each week) in the postseason since the start of the 2011 season.

I have to admit, I’m surprised. CAR is the type of team (i.e., with similar strengths and weaknesses) we always seem to have trouble with.

Mark M

Seems about right to me. The only real surprise I see for this weekend is NE vs Indy. Luck is rapidly becoming amazing and stands a real shot at winning a shootout with Brady in my view. This could be another high scoring affair as both have high flying passing games and very little defense.

Tim

Go back and watch the first half of the Indy game last sunday…. Yeah he pulled it together later in the game but he was flat out terrible for the first half. That won’t fly against the top eight

Rodgohard

Never understood why the 9ers didn’t play Aldon Smith much at all in that last game against Carolina. Remember Ray McDonald being hurt, as well as Vernon Davis, Crabtree, and Q. Patton out. Kaepernick made the play to win the game but Vance McDonald dropped a wide open pass down field. Also Roman continuing to run Frank Gore into a brick wall with his power package. There were no screen passes to deter so many blitzes. All this should change next game.

johndurbinn

*had* trouble with before we were actually healthy.

Bigmouth

While injuries undoubtedly cost us the last time we played CAR, we’ve had this problem throughout Harbaugh’s tenure. We match up better against teams with strong offenses but weak defenses like GB.

Bigmouth

Indeed. And let’s not forget Luck pulled it together against a Chiefs team that was decimated by injury and playing prevent D most of the day. While the comeback was impressive, it strikes me as an indictment of playing prevent defense too early as much as anything else.

Dirk Suave

Don’t forget teams that have Kaep-like QB’s. They also make trouble for Niners. Should be a great game.

johndurbinn

Not fully sold on that notion. The first game vs Carolina, Cam’s stats were nearly as bad as Kap’s.

Geo77

Rod- Let’s hope they change. Especially the stubborn refusal to stop running against a team stacked for the run. Part of the blame for all those sacks in the first game is refusing to pass until you’re stuck at 3rd and long after 2 unsuccessful runs. Let’s get creative Harbaugh!

Mark M

If there was ever a game to show that a half isn’t a whole game, that was it. It’s easy enough to isolate a quarter or a half to prove something but that is hardly the full story. Luck was magnificent and pulled out an incredible win when he had to. Winning teams rarely play great for all 4 quarters as we know all too well here in SF.

It’s not like the Pats are a dynamo defensively either. In fact, the Pats gave up more passing yards and passing TDs than the Colts did over the regular season. Of course, that isn’t the full story either, but I’m simply saying that both teams are explosive passing the ball, and not very good at stopping the pass. I’m expecting a shootout.

ssclesq

Sounds like kap wants a little pay back . Panthers are proud of their d, but common they aren’t Seattle. More important is our d. These guys have pride, and with fangio finally focusing on pass rush ( per aldon smith) we could devastate this team. Pass rush wins Super Bowls, see giants vs the superior pats x2. If whe go after cam newton and dump him well see if he can do a Rogers thing. I think Willis bowman brooks and the smith brothers should be really up for this game. Go 49ers!

Tim

Good points, and I think Luck is a tremendous talent, I just don’t think he is one the top elite QB’s as of yet. I think the hype is a little overblown personally. He was more ready to step in and play than other rookie in some time, but he has had struggles this year and KC, quite honestly, is not nearly as good as people think. The only playoff team they beat this year was Philly and that was in the beginning of the season when Philly was 1-3. The chiefs just are not that good.

Tim

Honestly Carolina should be embarrassed they only beat us by 1 point. Erid Reid and Vernon Davis left that game early with concussions. Crabtree and Aldon Smith didn’t play. And we had several other players down as well.

Tim

take away eric reid, aldon smith, vernon davis, and crabtree and tell me how many playoff games we will win. Because those are the players who either didn’t play or who left the game early against carolina in the first matchup. and they beat us by 1 point.

49ers are healthy and Carolina is going to face a much tougher team.

Mark M

Couldn’t agree more with you about KC. Mediocre team, garbage schedule and the Colts killed them at the end of the season.

But I guess I disagree with you on Luck. I see almost no running game, missing his only elite receiver, porous injured defense, and yet winning week after week, if not always in a pretty way. It falls on Luck’s shoulders every week and yet they win. I think he’s elite already.

johndurbinn

Preaching to the choir my brotha

Bigmouth

Colts’ running game is terribly underrated. They averaged 4.3 yards/attempt, while we averaged 4.4. And if you take away Kap’s production, the comparison is even more favorable.

In fact, IND was ranked 11th in rushing offense, but only 17th in passing, according to DVOA.

Chefs were clearly overrated, but be fair. They lost their truly elite RB, who was exactly what they needed to run down the clock on offense, not to mention another RB, a CB, and a WR.

Bigmouth

I agree. Luck is a tremendous talent, who may well be elite someday, but he’s not there yet and the hype is getting out of control. For all their talk of running the football (which they actually did a LOT better than last year) Colts still leaned too heavily on Luck’s arm this season.

Bigmouth

Indeed. Kap-like QBs and Gore-like RBs. There’s a reason we struggle to beat SEA even at home.

Bigmouth

It’s not that we perform poorly on defense against these teams. We also shut down R Wilson and M Lynch. But we still have a tendency to lose, and I think it’s because our offense has trouble getting going against tough defenses.

Bigmouth

Agreed. But we have struggled against mirror-image teams like CAR (and SEA) when we were healthy, too.

Mark M

That’s incorrect. NFL.com has the Colts ranked 20th in rushing in the regular season with 108 yards per game.

Bigmouth

What’s incorrect? I didn’t say anything about yards/game, which is poor way to measure a rushing offense’s efficiency imo. A team like us will always have higher rushing yards/game because we rush more times per game. That’s why I cited yards/attempt and DVOA (though these are hardly perfect).

RR

Olbermann did an interview with Weatherford, the NYG punter. He appeared to be taking a shot at the 49ers when he said teams that tried to call multiple plays and change them at the line of scrimmage were toast against Seattle. I have to agree with him and I think the same applies against Carolina. I hope they call a crisp game with multiple screen passes and good running schemes against Car. Their front seven is even better than Seattle and will punish poor management calling plays. GO NINERS!